Posts filed under 'What the fuck?'

So that happened, and by that, I mean a large, terrifying chunk of my next-door neighbor’s tree crashing down on both of our cars in the wee hours of Friday morning.

HAAAAAAA. Yes, seriously! Seriously! A tree crushed our cars! There’s really nothing else to say, because my car is as close to totaled as it can get without actually being totaled, although the jury is still out. We woke up at 5:30 to a too-quiet house and an alarm system that wouldn’t stop beeping, which meant we had no power. Sam, she of the 8 a.m. daily risings, was pretty pissed off that not only was she awake at such an ungodly hour, but there was no Yo Gabba Gabba to take the edge off. It wasn’t until we’d been sitting in the dark for a good fifteen minutes when Adam looked outside and saw this:

I know! It doesn’t look that bad … does it? I mean, it certainly doesn’t look like our cars are DEAD or anything. Adam’s is actually fine — for the love of God, he drove it to work a few hours later — mine, however, is smooshed. Paint gone, hood smashed, windshield in smithereens. The tree removal guy rang my doorbell and sheepishly handed me a PIECE OF MY CAR, asking, “So, ahhh, what should I do with this?” Bits of the engine are sticking out all over the place! The tires are falling off! The fender! IS DANGLING OFF.

What started out as a $5K estimate is rising by the minute, and all I can really say is, thank God for car insurance, AMIRITE?

As a result, I have been tooling around town in a Dodge Caliber, and I hate it. I hate it! It’s tiny and handles terribly and GAH, I hate it! WHERE IS MY HONDA? CAN I GET A HONDA, ANY HONDA? Oh, rental car companies and their hard-on for American made cars. (OH I KNOW. I KNOW. I JUST LIKE MY HONDAS.)

I have to be honest in that I find the whole thing sort of hilarious. Despite the inconvenience and the, ah, smashed car, I just … I don’t really care, honestly. It’s just a car. I’ve got a $300 deductible that will probably be picked up by my neighbor’s home owner’s insurance (it was his tree), and I just … well, it’s just a car, you know? It’s a car, and a memory, and after the year we’ve had, I don’t really give a rip what happens to any inanimate object of mine, and so long as my kid, husband and dog are safe and sound, I am happy. Ergo, I can’t help but find the whole thing so goddamned hilarious, I can’t stop snickering about it. My CAR was smashed by a TREE. What are the fucking CHANCES?

(Apparently pretty high, for when I talked to my insurance agent at 8:30 a.m. that day, I was the *fifth* tree-smashed car that day. Heavy snow and high winds = a bad combination.)

ANYWAY, thanks to all of you, at least in part, Sam is registered for two-day preschool. Which means that I will have six glorious hours each week to while away doing glamorous things like steaming the floors and doing laundry ALL BY MYSELF. It’s very exciting and also sick-inducing, as I know you are fully aware, and ultimately, I think it was the right decision.

See what I just did there? Talked about it like it was Harvard again. GEEENYUS.

Besides all this crap, I’ll tell you two things that are killing me right now, mostly with excitement:

1) Vegas. OMFG, I have never been so ready to go on a vacation in my life. I just want to SLEEP and take BATHS and go to the POOL and READ and I know, those are not things one thinks of in Vegas, but I’m telling you, THAT IS WHAT I AM DOING. I am less excited about leaving my little beanpole, who at her well-baby visit today was declared The Tallest Two Year Old In All The Land, clocking in at 38 inches tall and in the 99th percentile for her age. Her weight is a delightfully proportionate 30 pounds. And while I am dying to sleep and read without interruption, I am so sad to miss her, because she is …

2) God, I love Sam right now, tantrums and all. How can you not be excited about this kid? Come on.

She never makes this face unless the camera is out.

You can’t see it, but she’s also wearing a swim bubble. And has also found my stash of Trader Joe’s wine.

Sunny, too, deserves an award, because this happens, like, a JILLION TIMES A DAY and while she loves getting love, let’s be realistic, the hugging is a bit aggressive.

Well, I am nothing if not consistent, if by consistent, you mean absent, but the sickopalypse continued, plus I had two work deadlines, and that meant lack of sleep and lack of many things, but sleep! I missed sleep a lot.

What’s crazy is that I cannot figure out WHY I am so pathetically tired on a level I wasn’t before I had Sam. What the EFF, right? I mean, I used to work until well past midnight and then get up for work at 6, but now when I try ANYTHING close to that — getting up at 7 or later, even! — I am DEAD. DEAD. FOR DAYS. WEEKS, EVEN. (And before you mention it, I’m already medicated for my thyroid and other stuff, so it’s not medical, it’s that I’m a wimp. Either that, or my job is much more, um, physical, I guess.)

It’s like the Pussification of Jonna, up close and in the flesh. Just now I whined in Adam’s general direction that he had to set an alarm for 7:15 tomorrow morning because it’ll wake us all up earlier than I’d like. Bear in mind, please, that my preshus offspring usually sleeps until 8, and here I am, most spoiled mother in America. And yet I am exhausted.

I went to the dentist today, and as it turns out, I do NOT have a failed root canal, and Deb was totally right, in that it was referred pain because the tooth is RIGHT under my sinuses, and it was (OMFG) SINUS PAIN. And also, I grind my teeth like a mo’ fo’, and which reminds me, GET THIS: So the dentist is all up in my shit because I’m wearing my teeth down to nubs and then — THEN! — he’s pointing out that my teeth should never touch, which is something I did not know, honestly. Do your teeth touch when you’re just sitting there? Please check and report back. I’ll wait.

Obviously mine do, AND I grind them horribly, but what killed me is that he stared at me as I was doing this and very gravely announced, “Relaxed people do not do this. It’s a stress thing. You really need to relax.”

And I’m like, hey dude, for starters, my day job involves running around after a small person who yells at me constantly, and when she’s not yelling at me, she’s clinging to me like an extra appendage. I never, ever sit by myself. I sit down for five whole seconds, and Sam’s all up in my grill and then Sunny! Sunny has to sit on me, too! I DO NOT SIT ALONE. EVER. I don’t even pee alone. I haven’t peed alone since 2005, because Sunny hasn’t let me pee alone, and now Sam and … oh, man, I forgot what going to the bathroom unwitnessed was even like, because there are FOUR EYEBALLS on me when I pee, OK?

Both of those people need my assistance in some way to poop (shut up, Sunny is people). I wipe someone else’s butt multiple times a day. Then, when I get a reprieve from the small person, I get to go outside and fish dog poopsicles out of the back yard and fold laundry and then when Sam goes to sleep? Then I get to do my other job, and we haven’t even TALKED about the last few months involving death, pregnancy loss and divorce of some of my closest friends, and I’m ALL WHY DON’T YOU RELAX AND HAVE YOUR TEETH NOT TOUCH, BUDDY. WALK A MILE, KNOW WHAT I’M SAYING?

I didn’t say any of that. I laughed awkwardly and agreed, but I just wanted to say it! I wanted to! And I never get all martyrous (kind of not a word), but I do not KNOW, I just think this is what happens when you don’t get enough rest and you find yourself spiraling towards burnout.

(For the record, I have nothing due in the immediate future, so I will recover nicely. PLUS, we are really and truly scheduling a child-free vacation AND this mini-breakdown made me realize I was definitely right in turning down a big project recently, because although I would have secured more regular child care for it, I just … well, I am fried, clearly, can you tell? If not, I can rant more about how HAAARD my privileged little life is, if you want to. I’d want to smack me, if I were you, so if you tell me I’m a spoiled brat, I don’t blame you one whit. First-world whining, FTW!)

Separately, I have five cavities and apparently need TWO cleanings with the hygienist to get shit done in there, and when I defensively mewled, “But I brush! I FLOSS!” he simply responded, “Yes, everyone says they brush, but …” and then he just trailed off.

For those of you who asked for photos of the snow, I give you my house, which is virtually unrecognizable compared to its normal form. Like, from this photo, you cannot even tell what it normally LOOKS LIKE. I’m not worried about anyone appearing on my doorstep, because GOOD LUCK FIGURING OUT WHICH ONE IS MINE IN THE DRIFTS. The whole neighborhood looks THE SAME. Entire trees are buried! My CAR is in there somewhere! (Can you see the very wee tippy top of my car? I DRIVE AN SUV. THE SUV IS TOO SHORT FOR THE DRIFTS.)

I got out today, and it changed my life, dudes. I went to a friend’s house with other friends, and I laughed and I had conversations and my kid played with toys that weren’t hers, and I came back and did something other than lie about on the couch like a bump on a pickle and THIS. This is living, people. Putting on real pants and drinking coffee made by someone else’s coffee pot and HOO BOY, that’s the high life, right there.

It’s really a shame we’re getting more snow on Saturday, then.

I mean, seriously.

Meanwhile, the other morning, Adam accosted me just out of bed and was all, “You peed in the middle of the night and it SMELLED TERRIBLE. I had to GET UP AND FLUSH THE TOILET! It WOKE ME UP!”

Um, okay, several things: 1) I did not pee. No one did. 2) When was the last time someone PEED in the NEXT ROOM and woke someone up with the stench? OMFG. 3) His statement was immediately followed by, “WAIT, I STILL SMELL IT. DID YOU JUST PEE AGAIN?”

Um, no.

The culprit? The chicken stock I had simmering all night in the crock pot, which apparently smells like foul pee. Looking forward to making rice pilaf with it! Viva la urine rice!

Separately, and apropos of LITERALLY nothing, we’re in the throes of researching our trip to the Caribbean (because after the January we had, OH YES) without our precious offspring (thank you, parents!) and I almost had a panic attack looking at the pictures of scuba diving that popped up in a travel website. Mind you, I have always thought that scuba diving would totally be on my life list if I had one, but here we are five or six trips to the Caribbean in, and I’ve never gone, thinking, oh, next time! I’ll get certified first and go next time! And then today happened and I saw a photo of dolphins underwater, and I realized that right then and there, if something large and dolphin-like, no matter how friendly, came towards me underwater, I would do one of two things: a) die, right then and there; b) lose utter control of my bowels.

I’m going with Option B, and then the poop would attract OTHER wildlife, and then I would die anyway, because I would be eaten.

Thus, it is declared: I will never go scuba diving and I am perfectly okay with this. For God’s sake, I have a FEAR of LARGE THINGS underwater, AND I am a little claustrophobic and NO. NO.

I will also never, ever venture into space, no matter how accessible and affordable it becomes. I don’t care if Richard Branson himeffingSELF wants to fly me up in a private rendezvous with Alexander Skarsgard, Philip Seymour Hoffman (what?) and TIM EFFING RIGGINS (yes, I know he’s fictional, STOPIT). I AM NOT GOING INTO SPACE.

And finally, a few photos of Sam that are KILLING ME. This is actually the third and fourth in a series of her in the same outfit, same place in the house. And yet, things go horribly awry between photo three:

And photo four:

Since these photos were taken long enough ago that I have absolutely no idea what happened, or WHY I kept snapping instead of stepping in, I’m totally blaming Elmo, lying there all innocent-like. That little red bastard stuck his foot out, I KNOW he did.

Update: Kid has hand, foot and mouth disease. Which may contribute to her assholery. OH DUH.

Thank you for all of your comments on my last post. Because MAN, I felt like I was drowning for a little while there, and dammit, if today we didn’t have THIRTEEN tantrums. THIRTEEN! FULL-BORE! TANTRUMS! With kicking! And throwing herself on the ground to complete said kicking! BAHAHA HAHAHA. HAHAHAHAHAHA

OMFG.

I mean, intellectually, as a parent you know this is coming, right? But when it happens, it’s still just so STUNNING. Also, I will admit that one of the things I’m struggling with is some leftover PTSD from when she was an infant and cried all day, every day. Uncontrolled crying? MUST STOP IT, STAT. This means I spent the first several weeks after the tantrums began GIVING IN to the tantrums, trying to figure out what was wrong. OH HO HO HO, genius move, right there. This, friends, I believe is the reason that we have EXTRA tantrums. Manufactured stress, for the win! Parenting skills worth repeating! RIGHT HERE.

Sorry to go on like this. It’s just so ALL CONSUMING, as you know. And worse, I’m starting to think that I’m just not creative enough for this parenting shit. I run out of activity ideas after the first hour of the day, and then I’m left scrambling, with a tantrummy kid, thinking that surely, there has to be some sort Parent Emergency Pill, like a cyanide-type one used in combat (can you tell I’m reading Mockingjay?), only it doesn’t kill you, but maybe sends some kind of ALERT ALERT WOOP WOOP to the local Parenting Squad and someone — anyone — will swoop in and deposit a nanny or at least someone who knows their way around Play Doh for a few minutes.

Seriously, let’s add “Difficult to Play With” under the challenges of 18 months. Too little to sit still for any sort of prolonged activity (drawing, Play Doh); too big to just feel up a bunch of toys and watch them crinkle, you know?

You know. And you are over hearing about it. ME TOO. WHERE IS MY PILL?

Good thing she’s cute, is all I’m saying, am I right?

Totally worth it, I am embarrassed to admit.

In other scintillating news (wow, our lives are THRILLING these days), Sunny’s Stomach Ailment of Mystery reared its ugly head on Saturday night/Sunday morning, as I woke up at 4:30 a.m. to Adam using a miniature flashlight (so considerate, that man of mine, God bless him) to clean up more of her puke, and HOO BOY, I feel terrible for her, but we are also a bit on the Over It side. And obviously, though it was planned that I would sleep late on Sunday and Adam would take Sam out and about, that was jettisoned, because it’s an unspoken rule that whoever cleans up the puke gets to sleep late, end of story. Especially if the puke happens at 4:30 a.m.

Adam slept later than he had in years, and I don’t know that there is anyone who deserved it more. Seriously, he cleaned up PUKE, in the DARK at FOUR IN THE MORNING. And was a ninja-like, so as not to wake me! Awww.

First of all, do you love how Joanna appeared in the comments? Poor Joanna. I can now add “Bully readers into becoming friends!” into my list of dubious accomplishments. Although if I were SUPER crafty, I’d have put it on my life list, then figured out how to brand that shit.

(Secretly, I am very excited. I LIKED Joanna, right away. And here is her website. See? Likable.)

In other news, we started a new gym class with Megan and Lila, and while I really liked it, I … well, there’s no other way to say this. The instructor we had was a bit of a beefcake. No, I’m sorry, a LARGE BEEFCAKE. Hot and built and kind of … well, not remotely my type, but objectively speaking, a superhot gym-rat kind of guy. A SINGLE superhot gym-rat kind of guy. A single, IN HIS LATE TWENTIES, superhot gym-rat kind of guy, who called all the little girls in the class “princesses.”

Friends, are you thinking what I’m thinking? He’s there to meet MILFs. There’s no other explanation. Honestly, I felt like I was in some weird Desperate Housewives-meets-Edward Scissorhands-meets-Jackie Collins-type scenario where all these lonely housewives go clamoring for the hot young gym guy. A guy who teaches at THE LITTLE GYM, where the oldest client is guaranteed to be no older than, say, FIVE.

Truth be told, he was an excellent teacher — so good with the kids, honestly, and not even a little inappropriate with any of the moms — but I was somewhat relieved when I learned he was that was his last class, as he’s leaving THE LITTLE GYM OH MY GOD, to go back to school to pursue, wait for it, a degree, THEN A WIFE AND FAMILY. (A dozen MILFs just fainted right now.) (Seriously, the guy seemed to have GAME, and again, he is AT THE LITTLE GYM, LAND OF THE MILFS) The whole thing was just so … distracting, but not for the reasons you would think. I wasn’t gazing at his bulging biceps or anything (Seriously, he isn’t my type at all.) (But yes, my type of course is a hot guy, and yes, I married one, but not THAT type of hot, you know what I mean?), but I just kept wondering if anyone in the class was going to slip him their phone number.

So I … I don’t know what it says about me and our totally sexist society, as well as my own bizarre attitudes of sex, gender and child-rearing, but the entire time I was just like, SERIOUSLY, DUDE? What are you DOING here? You, with your ripped arms and Everett accent and, I’m guessing, Goodwill Hunting-style Fila jumpsuits during your off-duty hours. Toddlers are awesome, but are you … after this are you HEADING TO THE MILF’S PLACE FOR A HOUSECALL, OH MY GOD?

I’m an asshole. But that’s all I could think about the whole time.

Speaking of sex and gender, and this is a holy non-sequitur if I ever did launch one, but after finding a box of old photos, I was once again reminded of my college course on human sexuality — you know, the one EVERYONE took pass/fail for no other reason to get credit for sitting around listening to people talk about sex in a large lecture hall. It was mostly rather tame and surprisingly snooze-worthy, but I vividly remember the section on “alternative sexualities,” whatever that means, and they brought in some guest speakers to talk about the life of a bisexual.

Holy. Hell. Holy FAIL, Batman. All of the bisexuals were men, all of whom were married, all of whom regularly cheated on their wives without their knowledge or consent, with other men. All of whom were cheaters. THAT’S the paradigm of bisexuality they held up for us. How unfortunate. How … how subversive, really, now that I think about it. Sneaky fuckers, to make bisexuals look like total douchebags who can’t be bothered with little things like morals, which is absolutely, unequivocally not the case.

(Jerry Falwell is screaming from the grave.)

Look, it makes no difference who you have sex with or if you like sex with BOTH sexes, depending on the person, but Jesus, Syracuse University, that was the best you could do to demonstrate bisexuality? A bunch of cheating, philandering men? That’s … well, that’s awful, is what it is, and I was so pissed about it that I, in a rare display of pure in-person rage, walked right up to one of them after class and called him an asshole to his face, saying exactly that. Telling him that wanting to have sex with men AND women is fine, but it is not fine if you stand up there and ask us to accept you for who you are, when what you are is a CHEATING SACK OF SHIT.

He was displeased, but oddly gracious.

I’m still mad about that, but I’m mad at the professor for using them as an example to help people understand people who are different from them. That’s not a good example, or a kind one, or a fair one to put on impressionable minds, some of whom may walk away thinking all bisexuals are philandering assholes. Many years later, I MAY BE MOVED TO WRITE A LETTER.

Anyway, also in the box of college photos were pictures of the boyfriend whom I later learned got married to a woman in the TACKIEST DRESS KNOWN TO MAN. (Seriously, I wish I could show you the picture. You would die.) Also, the boyfriend who is now some crazy liturgical pastor at a southern superchurch (JOEL OSTEEEEEEN!). Aaaand, of course, the boyfriend who owns a Jewish girls’ summer camp in Maine. The one who hates me. The one who REALLLY hates me (it did not end well, and apparently he still harbors a grudge), but who now lives in my mothereffing TOWN, who I may, when he returns from summer camp, give a HEART ATTACK over the vine tomatoes at the grocery store.

HOO BOY, nothing like the old college photos to remind you that you made the right choice in life, that’s for sure. Oh, Adam. Thank God for you and your non-tacky, non-camp-owning, non-Fila-jumpsuiting, non-religious-preaching ways.

WE-E-ELL! I have returned after an unplanned week away. Whoops! So! Instead of updating you on the minutiae of what happened in the last week (hint: a deadline, a parental visit, and a few other busy-like things and it’s been so fun-filled that I haven’t even seen this week’s True Blood, is all I’m saying), I am going to tell you the TWO RUDEST THINGS EVER that I can’t get out of my mind and maybe YOU can share other rude things and we can all marvel together! Marvel! At the rudeness!

My mom and stepdad recently moved to a new house. Like, THREE WEEKS AGO. (Note: these are not the parents who were visiting, and yes, I have two sets of parents and I am super lucky like that, and yes, that means two moms and it is ALL VERY CONFUSING, and I’m terribly sorry about that.)

So! They moved on a Thursday, and on Saturday, they had a wedding to go to — the groom is the son of some friends of theirs from church; apparently they aren’t BFF with this couple, but they’re friendly enough, I guess. Now, a few weeks PRIOR, my mom ordered a bunch of stuff for the couple off of their registry, but in the move, it ended up in my brother’s car for, um, safekeeping I guess. I don’t even know. But the morning of the wedding, my mother realizes the gift is in his car, is too late to go find him and just decides to mail it later and … well, this doesn’t seem to be a huge deal, AM I RIGHT?

So! Wedding comes and goes, it’s the Tuesday after the wedding, and my mom locates the gift, puts it in the mail and forgets about it. UNTIL!! That afternoon, she fields a call from the mother of the groom, who says, “Tommy said it would be okay if I called you about this, and I hope you don’t mind, but he noticed that there wasn’t a gift from you at the wedding.”

ARE YOU DEAD YET. BECAUSE IT IS AT THIS POINT THAT I BELIEVE I DIED. BUT OH, IT GETS WORSE. BECAUSE SHE GOES ON TO SAY:

“And we thought maybe it was lost, so if you just want to write a new check and pop it in the mail this week, I know they would really appreciate it.”

WHICH MEANS THEY ASSUME THAT IT IS MONEY. AND THEY WANT IT. NOW. THIS IS THE MOTHER OF THE GROOM OH HOLY PANTS.

(It was, if you recall, items off of their registry.)

Now my mother, to her credit, did not tell them to stick an entire fraudulent checkbook directly into their ass, which is what I like to THINK I would have done, but in all likelihood, I’d have stammered something nice and awkward, which is precisely what my poor mother did.

COULD YOU DIE?

I hope they liked the towels and sheets she got them. AHEM.

And now we are moving on to the SECOND rude thing that involves a person I encountered again recently, and for the sake of everyone, let’s leave out how and where and who it is. But it’s an acquaintance that I will likely see somewhat regularly now that we’re all back in the same general area.

So! The first and last time I saw this person was about eight or nine years ago, and we were all recently engaged and happy times, hurrah! She was … well, kind of cold, and I felt as much of a connection with her as I would, say, Paris Hilton, but I tried! I really, really tried. One of my last (and lamest) attempts at conversation was noticing that we had the same style of engagement ring (three-stone Bostonian, whatever) and her reply was, I SHIT YOU NOT:

“Oh! It looks like we do. But mine is bigger.”

I was honestly just sort of stunned into silence, because WHO SAYS THAT? WHO SAYS THAT? It’s one thing if you think it, but please, my God, don’t say these things out loud! Shut your pie hole! Exercise restraint! AND WHAT DOES THAT MEAN, ANYWAY? That you WIN at engagement rings? That your fiance spent a few thousand dollars more? OH MY LANDS WHO CARES? WHO CARES? NO ONE CARES.

(For the record, she was as big of a douche as I remembered. Good times.)

Rude, right? Are you dead from rudeness? Now please, if you would, hit me with your worst rudeness, because I need more to stew about over here, apparently.

Well! That’s over. We had a family wedding this weekend, with houseguests, and have I ever mentioned that I love houseguests? I do. It’s a very strange thing, apparently, but a houseful of people always makes me feel warm and fuzzy and weirdly safe, like we can’t be broken into or murdered or anything strange, because there are so! many! people! Who could get away with such a thing? We have four-ish bedrooms and every last one of them was occupied by someone who would doubtless scream if intruded upon. Safety!

Plus, you know, I enjoy their company. That’s true, too. But once houseguests leave, there is the cleaning. Oh, the cleaning. Everything has three times as much dirt on it as before, because there were three more people involved and now there are toilets and laundry and maybe even bears, oh my!

It was a relatively uneventful family wedding–beautiful, loving and all that jazz. Two nights prior, however, my kid lost her shit at a family dinner in a janky-but-delicious Chinese restaurant (South Pacific in Newton, for those playing along at home–they have an original tiki room and serve scorpion bowls), and for the FRILLIONTH time, discovered that my kid bawls like a maniac whenever she’s confronted with an old(er) lady, this time being her great-aunt. There’s a juvenile prejudice that’s fun to explain! Hi! My kid hates old ladies! Yes, I’m sure YOU are lovely, but you are very clearly OLD and old ladies freak her out! So please, no no, don’t say hi to her, thanks. At all. It freaks her out. Yes, even you. YES, YOU, OLD LADY. YOU TOO.

Nice, right? Nice. My kid’s an ageist little pooper.

I am also really unclear why a restaurant, upon seeing a TABLEFUL of kids under the age of four, would refuse to deviate from their plan of offering their pu pu platters with towering flames in the center, but then again, some things defy logic, am I right? Here, kids! Let’s practice lighting our eyebrows on fire!

Anyway. Let us now discuss stink bugs. Do you guys KNOW what stink bugs are? HA HA. They look like this. (LINK TERRIFYING! WARNING!) And did you know those em effers can FLY? I did not know this. I had NO idea, in fact, until the other night when I thought I saw a fly and watched it land and NEARLY EFFING DIED. You can’t kill them, you see, because their stupid pheromones go shooting out and then you have a plague of stink bugs, not to mention they, um, STINK.

So there I am, trying to be calm and shit while I aim to trap it in two, um, cups (what?) and then … I LOST IT. AND FELT SOMETHING DOWN MY BACK. AND MADE A STRANGLED KIND OF NOISE. And God, look, there was wild running around and crazy tapdancing, and I wanted so bad to scream, but you know, MUST NOT WAKE BABY, so I just waved myself around wildly while frantically whispering, “HELP ME. HELP ME. HELP ME.”

HELP NEVER CAME. Or rather, it did, but HELP WAS LAUGHING TOO HARD TO ACTUALLY HELP. This went on for several minutes until I finally just locked myself on the sun porch and got buck naked, dislodging the stink bug from … oh God, from WHEREVER IT WAS, and Adam took it outside, thank you Jesus, and Amen.

GHWRLKHTHEWARTTICKETH.

I mean, RIGHT?

And now, let us cleanse ourselves with a delightful picture of my daughter, looking rather diabolical, yet adorable, in her wedding finery. Well, with strawberry stains, but whatever.

(Yes, that’s me in the background at an Unfortunate Angle, I hope, as I am looking rather PREGNANT, which is a state that I am not, I assure you.)

Weeeelll, that’s right, friends, I have a blog. Life, it seems, is returning to normal. I hope. This past week was a mishmash of deadline (Glee, and though I love writing those things, they take me FOREVAH) and unpacking and honestly, just stupid dumbass insanity. Without going into it, allow me to share a brief glimpse, bullet-style:

— Our car broke on Adam’s first day of work. Luckily, he took my (newer, fresher, made in this decade) car to work just in case. Had car towed, $550 worth of repairs enacted and … car still broken. More repairs. Three days later (THREE DAYS. OF ME NOT LEAVING THE HOUSE AT ALL. WITH A TODDLER), learn that the car is NOT broken, but Adam had given me his “spare” key, which is an uncoded VALET key, which means it cannot start the car. $250 worth of useless labor expenses, not to mention $100 for a rental car, later, and our car was returned to us in exactly the same condition it was when I tried to start it.

Awesome, right? AWESOME. AND YET!

— Thrush! I got thrush again, and stuffed myself silly with probiotics and kicked it. Again. But not before those three days of being house-bound with a cranky kid and an assload of THRUSH! And no way to fix it! Because I could not get to Whole Foods!

THRUSH! And cabin fever! WIN WIN WIN.

— Bizarre suicide hostage crisis a few blocks from here! With rifles! And SWAT teams! And what the hell! We live in ADORABLE SUBURBAN USA. Not, say, Compton at the height of the crack epidemic.

— A hair appointment that wasn’t, wherein I was dicked around by the first receptionist, when I scheduled a consult and (long) appointment to have my frightening, frightening long-overdue hair colored. Then, when I got there was told I only had a consult, and not a real appointment, which would be fine, except that then the second receptionist said there was no way I EVER had a real appointment in a totally mean tone of voice and then, when I tried to explain, RAISED HER VOICE and said there was no way that happened, and have I ever had my hair colored at a reputable salon before? Because I should have known better.

Me. The customer. Who booked the appointment that they screwed up. I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN BETTER. And she yelled it, too. And for some reason this makes it worse, but she was TWENTY THREE at best, and I’m all, BITCH, I’ve been getting my hair colored LONGER THAN YOU HAVE BEEN ALIVE.

So I said thanks, but no thanks to that haircut to nowhere, and stormed off, only to realize I had nowhere to go, because HA! we hadn’t picked up the car yet! So Adam dropped me off! For what he thought would be THREE AND A HALF HOURS! So I had just stormed out to … nothing. I had to sit on their porch while they glared at me out the window until Adam came back with Sam. Ha ha? HA HA HA.

Drama queen fail.

There was more, but I think that covers the highlights. It was a rough week. Smaller, more cheerful events include:

— Complete lack of impulse control now that I’m in sight of actual stores that carry actual things. I am going to send us to the poorhouse, not on extravagant things, but because I completely lack the ability to resist the vast array of cleaning products and other random sundries available at Target. Which brings me to …

— Swiffer! THE SWIFFER! How have I lived this long without a Swiffer? I can’t stop Swiffing! The house is sparkling! There isn’t a single speck of dog hair in sight! I Swiff three times a day! It’s so SATISFYING, all that Swiffing! I also picked up the Swiffer duster and have Swiffed the shit out of my baseboards! My mom suggested the WetJet, and oh dear, the can of worms she opened. I think I spent $60 in Swiffer products alone.

–I have lost (and regained and lost and regained) a lot of weight since having Sam and no matter what size the rest of my body is, my fingers have remained a half size bigger than they were before getting pregnant. Also? My feet are bigger, forever. Like, a whole half size. Which, um, ew.

Ergo, I gave in, friends, and took my wedding rings to be resized at the jeweler where we got them seven (SEVEN) years ago. It was a sad day, but it was time, I’m afraid.

But also? $200 to have them both done. I DIED. I REALLY DID. I know they’re diamond and platinum and it’s not like adjusting one of those rings you get in the gumball machine, but … really? I was floored by this, though I suppose there’s no real reason why. It’s not like I’d ever done it before, but perhaps had I known that, I wouldn’t have done it the same week I spent an ungodly amount on cleaning products, mythical car repairs and other sundry items purchased for no other reason than Because I Could, Dammit, and Finally.

— Our kid is sleeping through the night. DING DONG and HELLO. That only took … fourteen and a half months. She’s sleeping past 5, too, and I owe it all to Twitter, who provided some awesome advice when I threw out a random APB for assvice, and to Accidents, who shared her nightweaning plan. We moved from two naps to one (still a struggle to get that nap to be any length, but …) and I did a little Lite Ferber action (not even any effing crying, just yelling for about five minutes) and WHAT? THAT’S IT? THAT’S ALL IT TOOK?

There is also the small matter of Mr. Mouse, her chosen lovey, and let me tell you, my world is brighter because of Mr. Mouse. She gets EXCITED to go to bed with Mr. Mouse. She SNUGGLES Mr. Mouse. She PLAYS with Mr. Mouse before bed and at the moment, I am currently purchasing the entire stock of Mr. Mouse NATIONWIDE, so don’t even think about trying to buy a mouse toy right now. I’m on that shit and I will SNIPE YOUR ASS ON EBAY. (Or just order it from Kohl’s for $5. Whichever.)

— Sam’s walking! Sort of. She’s still holding on to stuff one-handed for comfort, but if she, say, has two shoes in her hands, she forgets that she’s not holding on to the wall and she just goes. The second she realizes she doesn’t have training wheels, she panics, gives up and crawls. But still! Steps! Oh my girl.

I am shocked — shocked! — at how much more I love the toddler vs. baby phase. I thought I would LOVE having a baby-baby, and, well, I didn’t. Not really. I mean, I loved her, of course, but it’s only gotten better and better and though I know I am in for a shitstorm when she turns three or so, I appreciate a communicative kid over a blob of inscrutable screaming any effing day of the week. Oh, this kid. She is so, so awesome.

*Insert adorable photo here, which I would totally do if I could find the camera, which I cannot. Not even a little*

(Wait, are we all not on a team? Are you not on my moving team? Do you want to be on my moving team? Quick! Come wrap some glasses! GO TEAM!)

So, we’re moving. And I am MUCH happier about it, as I suspected I would be once I figured out where we’d be going, and I went back to the area and we figured out where we want to live, etc. etc. SO MUCH HAPPIER ABOUT IT. Thank you for talking me off of the ledge. We found a house! That we love! With a giant yard for pug and baby to roam freely! And it’s so PEACEFUL out there, which is nothing like where we used to live in Boston, and … what a grand idea this is suddenly seeming like. Now, if only I could bring my friends.

Can I please bring my friends? Friends who are reading this, would YOU like to move to Boston?

That remains the saddest part of it all, and REALLY, by me acting okay with the move, it does not mean I won’t miss you. I PROMISE. I AM BEREFT.

MetroWest Bostonians, holler at me! And further, if you see someone who looks like me in the Natick Mall, it could very well BE me! Look at that!

So, that’s the good news. Really! The good news! Other good news: We got some actual sleep in the hotel, as we got a suite, as per EVERYONE’S recommendations, and HOO BOY, it was a NEW WORLD up in this piece. Sam slept! We slept! We woke up in the morning without wanting to die! LOOK AT US GO, SMRT PEOPLE THAT WE ARE. WE GOT THE BABY HER OWN ROOM.

JEENYUS.

At any rate, that’s kind of where the good news ends, and don’t get me wrong, it is all good news, and I will take it served hot, with a spoon and with a hearty helping of pleasure. What is not good news is that I lost my wallet somewhere in MetroWest — err, MetroNorth? What is Lexington, anyway? — and I had to go through EVERYTHANG and cancel all my credit cards and get new insurance cards and put an alert on my credit in case anyone tries to steal my identity and BAH BAH BAH. What perfect timing! Tomorrow we get to ride for an hour to visit the DMV so that I can get a new license and begin the process of reconstructing the flexibility I once had. You know, to leave the house by myself with access to money and the ability to drive.

And this was all happening RIGHT before an in-depth, up close and personal examination of my credit history! HUZZAH.

We COULD be moving in like, um, a week. Maybe. On the fast end. Which is insane, but it might happen if the movers can’t do anything later and hello, does anyone have a paper bag for me to breathe into? My whole body aches from bending over and packing and dragging boxes through our once-tidy house, and this afternoon, Sam came royally undone as we packed up a good portion of her room, because there we are, putting her precious possessions in boxes and it’s like, what the hell, Mom and Dad? Where my books at? You said that stuff was MINE and you LIED and … oh look! A toy hammer! All is forgiven.

Well. I also packed all the silverware and had no spoon for my coffee this morning and then later, oh HO HO LATER, Adam went on some kind of CLEANING FRENZY and decided, for reasons that still make no sense to me at all, to dump an entire FAMILY-SIZED JUMBO BOX of Hungry Jack instant mashed potatoes (HUNGRY JACK. Is that supposed to be appetizing? Like a hungry … lumberjack?) down the disposal and added water! HOT WATER. As in, he MADE AN ALARMING AMOUNT OF INSTANT MASHED POTATOES IN OUR GARBAGE DISPOSAL! And they expanded! And blocked the sink!

Which, you know, DUH. And for some reason, he insists that he asked me if this was okay and I guess I said yes, but I was distracted at the time, and you know, I didn’t think he’d put the WHOLE BOX DOWN THERE AT ONCE and I don’t even know why he didn’t just pack them or throw them away or … oh, what’s the use in dissecting it all, really. Just imagine, if you will, having this conversation with your husband:

Me: Is it clogged?

Him, exasperated beyond all belief: OF COURSE IT IS. I AM MAKING A BOX OF FUCKING HUNGRY JACK MASHED POTATOES IN OUR SINK.

Oh, hindsight, you are a cruel bitch. A cruel potatoey bitch.

This certainly puts the mild irritation of two-day old apple juice spilling in your diaper bag into perspective, doesn’t it? (Hint: it smells like a bar floor that’s been mopped with Woodchuck. DELISHUS.)

What’s saving me right now? I’m embarrassed to tell you. It’s … it’s the Glee “Power of Madonna” soundtrack, and y’all, I don’t even LIKE Madonna. It’s Jesse St. James, who I now have a futile crush on, and yes, of course I checked and yes, of course he’s gay and as it turns out it doesn’t matter! I crush anyway! And yet, I checked! EVEN THOUGH I AM HAPPILY MARRIED AND HE IS GAY. You see how these things work?

Me neither.

Hey, have a happy Monday!

*Um. I only have it from the Glee cast, so … Glee cast! Rachel Berry! Wait, you mean there’s someone else?

The other night we had thunderstorms, and Sunny was up until … 2:30 a.m. What the FUCK, you guys? I love my dog — really, I do — but the percentage of dog-to-baby night wakings in the last six months has tilted in the direction of the DOG. THE DOG. THE DOG. We’ve had night puking! Kennel cough! Thunderstorms!

THUNDERSTORMS. She was up all night crying, refusing to go to bed, making a thousand trips in and out of the baby’s room, waking the baby and .. and so on, until 2:45, when she was finally too tired to fight anymore. It goes without saying that Sam woke up at 5:30, right? Right, of course it does. Right. If there was a way for me to score myself a trip to the emergency room by scooping out my own damn eyeballs, let me tell you, I would have gladly done it. Gladly.

I mean, Jesus, we lived in Florida, where it thundered on an hourly basis. What pansy-ass dog have we raised, who can’t handle a little lightning without coming uneffing GLUED, right? Especially when she was BORN in the lightning capital of the world, what the everloving EFF?

It’s a good thing she’s cute and sweet, and doesn’t ever complain when the baby plays with her ears, because no matter how many times we admonish, “GENTLE! GENTLE!”, sometimes those ears get pulled. And instead of biting or lashing out, Sunny’s solution is to roll over, belly-up, crying uncle and licking Sam’s face. She’s a keeper, that one, even if we’re all so goddamn exhausted from her infantile shenanigans.

But still, my God, I don’t think anyone guesses or anticipates that one of the most annoying things about parenthood isn’t the baby. It’s the DOGS. And yet, this is such a universal feeling — every single one of my be-petted friends, and I mean EVERY SINGLE ONE, has reported hating their dogs at some point, particularly in the early days. I think it’s that babies suck every last drop of inconveniently-timed nurturing out of us, that by the time the dog needs something (AT 2 A.M., JESUS), we’re fresh out of giving a shit.

(Not that Sunny wants for anything. Please. Bitch be snuggled up in my armpit as I type this.)

Look, I kind of got nothin’, as we’re heading back to Boston early next week. This trip involves the oh-my-fuck search for housing if we end up having to go there and … well, THAT should be fun, trekking all over the major metro area in my sister’s minivan with my kid strapped in the back seat. See also: Looking at houses with no idea if you’re actually going to live there or not, because you don’t know if you’re moving, or not, but you have to look because if you ARE going to move, you have to do it SUPER FAST and … blergh, is really all that is. BLERGH.

You know what else is blergh? Owning a house in Florida that is basically unsellable. That is MEGA BLERGH. I kick around what to do with this albatross on a hourlydaily weekly basis, and it almost always involves palm sweating and high blood pressure. The issue, for those new to the story, is this: We bought a house in Florida when we lived there, for a (very) reasonable, affordable below-market price. To live in, not to flip. We lived in it. Market exploded, then imploded. Work brought us back up north. Large percentage of neighbors paid three times what we did for similar houses in our development (Would YOU pay not far from a million dollars for a 2,000 sq foot, 3bd, 2ba TOWNHOME? No. No, you would not. So why did some of them buy THREE at that price?) Said assholejerkface investors with truckloads of capital and no intention to live in the house unfortunate “neighbors” are now foreclosing, leaving homes in our neighborhood selling for $100K or less.

Yes, really. Oh, foreclosure! You’re such a good deal!

Ergo, we are stuck with this sucker (which is rented out at a small loss, currently, such is the sad state of the Floridian market) and it makes me rather, um, enraged. Because we could end up in a short sale or something similar, which ends up pummeling your credit while simultaneously involving a significant amount of ASS PAIN, but because it’s not our primary residence, we qualify for approximately none of the housing “fixes,” like mortgage modification, principal reduction, etc. But what’s the alternative? Owning this thing for another 20 years, when the market returns? Meanwhile, its mere existence on our balance sheet saps our will to live?

And there is no one to blame! No one saw this coming! OK, fine: I blame banks. And people who bought six houses with no intentions of living in any of them. But still! STILL!

So now we may be off going somewhere else and likely renting again until we figure out what to do with this thing, and OH I AM SO SICK OF IT. I am sick of being a homeowner, a tenant AND a landlord. It is by far the most exhausting combination, on this you must trust me. And while yes, it’s possible that we could afford to buy another house WHILE still owning our Florida house, let me tell you, THAT is the only combination that is more lethal than the one I’ve got now. Yes, let me own TWO houses while being a landlord and … oh my God, just institutionalize me now, why don’t you, please. Just get out the straitjacket and throw me overboard.

I’m sorry, that’s obviously not why you came here, is it? Clearly I’m a little stressed by all this (along with other thrilling blogger events of last week), as just this morning, I dreamed that there was some sort of blogger playdate, and I remember that the Artist Formerly Known As Schnozz was there (she doesn’t have children), along with Amalah and Anna and Jennie and … my dad had an affair with a friend of Amy’s, and somehow her friend ended up pulling a gun and there was a SHOOTING. A SHOOTING! At a playdate! But it was fine, because our kids were wearing kevlar and … oh, it’s so blatantly obvious that I need to relax, right? RELAX. Like Frankie says. It will all work out.

After all, I have my retirement home bought already and everything! Florida, here we come!